Royal Enfield, the world’s oldest surviving motorcycle manufacturer, certainly knows how to garner talent. Back in August, the company appointed Mr Rod Copes, former Head of global sales and customer service at Harley Davidson, as the President of their North American operation. Now in order to boost its product development team, the company has hired the services of Mr Pierre Terblanche.
Pierre Terblanche is a former employee from Italian motorcycle wizards Ducati. He has been known to produce some amazing products there at Bologna, some of which include the 2006 Ducati Multistrada 1000S, the 2005 Ducati Hypermotard, the 2005 Ducati ST3 and the Ducati 999 (2003). He is also the same guy who designed the 2014 Confederate X132 Hellcat Speedster. He has also been an asset to companies like Volkswagen, Cagiva, Moto Guzzi and now defunct Norton Motorcycles. Mr Terblanche will be taking over the position of the new Head of Design.
As a part of its rapid expansion plan, the company has also setup its third manufacturing facility, very near its existing plant at Oragadam industrial corridor in Chennai. The first factory at Thiruvottiyur was supplemented by the second one in Oragadam back in April 2013, which will allow the company to increase its annual prodiction to 4 lakh units in 2015.
The new plant in Vallam Vadakkal, which will be built over a 50 acre plot will further boost this number and is located just 10 km away from their second plant at Oragadam. This would be another step in Royal Enfield’s attempt to reduce the waiting time of their products.
